Built-in folding partitions and storage space allow Tenfold to be used as a home, classrooms, business spaces, pop-up shops, hospital operating theatres and emergency shelters for refugees

Inventor, David Martyn, said his children pay extortionate rents in London, and that he was inspired to build transportable flat-packed homes after watching a lorry go past him

The Ten Folds can also be fitted with solar panels and attachable units connecting them to the national electrical grid - meaning cheap electricity for the occupants

Furnishing such as sofas, beds, chairs, and tables can be tucked away in storage spaces and the whole unit is folded away and relocated in a truck without any specialist tools

Inventor David Martyn, 58, said its built-in folding partitions and storage space allow it to be used as a home, classrooms, business spaces, pop-up shops, hospital operating theatres and emergency shelters for refugees.

Furnishing such as sofas, beds, chairs, and tables can be tucked away in storage spaces and the whole unit is folded away and relocated in a truck without any specialist tools.

Mr Martyn and his team of four engineers have spent seven years and £4m developing and patenting their designs.

The father-of-four from Wallingford, Oxfordshire, said: 'It is households and instant extra bedrooms, it's mobile operating theatres - none of which have been possible until now.

'The idea is that this technology could easily make a £100,000 home affordable.

'It could make the option for someone to own a building who doesn't own the land.

'It will allow the young to get a building without owning the land, it changes the dynamics of the market which does need to change because it is a transportable property asset.

FUTURE LIVING: 'WE DREAM OF A HOME THAT CAN BE PACKED AND UNPACKED USING NOTHING MORE THAN A HAND CRANK'

While it is theoretically possible to manually unfold one, it would take around 'two week's at this stage in the development process, said the engineer

Ten Fold's aim is to one day create a product that can be both unpacked and packed up using nothing more than a hand crank.

That vision is yet to become a reality but even so, engineers have succeeded in a creating a system that unfolds using an 18V handheld drill.

Rowan Zarkov, the prototype's lead engineer, told MailOnline: 'The prototype in the video is around two years old. It was simply just an 18V battery that drove a gear box.

'The gear box then drives screws in the roof that pull up cables. The drive system installed is dependent on what the clients want.'

Mr Zarkov said a future prototype could be capable of unfolding using a hand crank that operated similarly to a drawbridge.

The current prototype uses a handheld drill with an 18V battery to unfold the structure - in just 8-9 minutes.

'We have high-powered drills on the back of lorries that could be used...our dream is so we can get it hand cranked', added Mr Zarkov.

While it is theoretically possible to manually unfold one, it would take around 'two week's at this stage in the development process, said the engineer.

'This one is a real all-singing all-dancing one. We tried to pack as much in to the design as possible and if someone comes along and want to use the licence, we would probably use it in a slightly different way.'

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'There's never been one before and this is a real solid building that doesn't have to stay in the same place.'

The Ten Folds can also be fitted with solar panels and attachable units connecting them to the national electrical grid.

'It's totally like any normal house, the only issue is that these units can be devised so they can be plugged into traditional infrastructure,' said Mr Martyn.

'This is about speed, size and ease and there's nothing else that does it.'

Mr Martyn, an architect, who said his children pay extortionate rents in London, said he was inspired to build transportable flat-packed homes after watching a lorry go past him.

Explaining his idea to use levers to allow a house to fold in on itself, he said: 'It was eventually during that reflective process that I worked out that you could link bits of the buildings together so that the things that went up were balanced with the bits that went down with no power.

'In some cases there are jacks that do this but you don't need cranes, builders or equipment and that makes it agile in a different way.

'This is about speed, size and ease and there's nothing else that does it', said Inventor David Martyn, 58, who is working alongside a team of four engineers on the project

Mr Martyn and his team of four engineers have spent seven years and £4m developing and patenting their designs.

Mr Martyn said his team have had six prototypes built and spent millions patenting his designs across the world. The designs are sleek, stylish and astonishingly practical.

Mr Martyn said: 'We've just had a project come in for 3,000 houses in South Africa... we've got people literally all over the world now'

'This is reducing the cost of building - it's basically factory built houses.

'You can have a house that you drive along and that you open up and you live in, or a shop that serves and opens and already has its mechanisms.

'It can been as on and off grid in principle as it needs to be.'

He said his team have had six prototypes built and spent millions patenting his designs across the world.

The creators of Ten Fold hope to revolutionise the UK property market by mass producing the stackable homes. The adaptable unit can then be packed up with all its furnishings and transported on a lorry just as quickly.

Stylish and elegant: This artist's impression of a flat-pack home is a far cry from the prefabricated homes built during and immediately after the end of the Second World War to tackle Britain's housing crisis

Endless possibilities: The structures can be stacked on top of one another meaning flat-packed buildings can accommodate a range of uses

A video of their design has gone viral on social media and the team now hopes to control the price of the homes by licensing manufacturers to mass-produce the homes.

Mr Martyn said: 'We've just had a project come in for 3,000 houses in South Africa... we've got people literally all over the world now.

'What we want is to get people to build theses for themselves and for the people in need.

'We can help by licensing the clever engineering that gives the opportunity (for affordable housing) to the people.

Inventor David Martyn, 58, said its built-in folding partitions and storage space allow it to be used as a home, classrooms, business spaces, pop-up shops, hospital operating theatres and emergency shelters for refugees

The flat-pack home are by no means cramped, either. This spacious example shows a living area, kitchen, dining area, bedroom and bathroom can all be fitted inside

'We have developed this clever technology and we are going to be licensing the right of using that.

'I hate to use the word cutting out the middle man but the actual cost of building a house isn't anything like what you're charged for it, it's a really complex scenario but our theory is to offer the access to the technology so we can recover our funds and do good.'

He added: 'The applications range form what the videos that have been showing off to offices, shops, you can do them big, you would have people waiting to do class showrooms, corporate flagships... it could be a partly mobile housing stock to cope with fluctuations in demand and in need whether it would be class rooms or houses for people (refugees) who just arrived.'

Mr Martyn added: 'I'm desperate that what we have created does real good and not every body likes to hear people say that but that's genuinely our position

He said of his young team of engineers: 'If they want to have a house they can do nothing but work and it's only because of the way the UK property market works.

'This project can resolve that but you can save Africa as well - you've got in the Middle East, they have an affection to being in the desert and this allows them to be there for a short period of time but bring their techno-tents back into the city - this is a really really big change we are talking about.'

He added: 'I'm desperate that what we have created does realLY good and not every body likes to hear people say that but that's genuinely our position.

'We would probably charge some kind of percentage out of it and there would be some altruistic variations on that no doubt as well.

'We've been working on this for the past seven years privately funded by people who want to do good work.

'There are people out there who have chosen to support this endeavour - they are philanthropists.

'We are on about £4m. We have four engineers and patents in England, Europe, China, Canada - probably the patent work is not far from half the total money.'

BUILDING ON PAST SUCCESSES: THE ENDURING LEGACY OF THE 'PRE-FAB' HOMES PLANNED TO SOLVE BRITAIN'S POST-WAY HOUSING CRISIS

Six prefab properties at Excalibur Estate in Catford, South London, were granted listed building status by the English Heritage after Lewisham Council approved a plan to replace the prefabs with 371 houses.

Pre-fabs were one solution to tackling Britain's housing shortage crisis following the end of the Second World War.

Some pre-fabs built during and immediately after the Second World War still stand to this day

Prime Minister Winston Churchill envisioned that within five years after the conflict, 500,000 prefab homes would be constructed to tackle an anticipated 200,000 shortfall in housing.

Under Clement Attlee's post-way Labour government, it was agreed that 300,000 units be delivered within 10 years.

While the programme set off to a good start, only 156,623 if the 1.2million new houses constructed between 1945 and 1951 were prefab homes.

Amazingly, a number of the structures survive to this day - despite being designed to withstand just 10 years of wear and tear.

Six prefab properties at Excalibur Estate in Catford, South London, were granted listed building status by the English Heritage after Lewisham Council approved a plan to replace the prefabs with 371 houses.